A prison in Baghdad, holding mostly Sunni Arab prisoners, has come under fire by Human Rights Watch for torture, abuse, and brutality, now reportedly worse than first suspected. A secret prison at the Muthanna military airfield, the prison was illegally run by military command, housing approximately 430 prisoners, most of which were transferred to another prison in Rusafa. The detainees were examined by the HRW, which found consistent evidence of abuse. The reports include being hung, whipped, raped, sodomized, among other horrifying things.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has denied any connections with the abuse, denying the existence of secret prisons in general. The discovery of the prison only adds to the sectarian conflict in Iraq between Shiite and Sunni. “All those held at the secret prison before it was shut down were brought to Baghdad from Sunni Arab areas in Nineveh where Mr. Maliki, a Shiite, is largely perceived as a sectarian leader with a personal vendetta against anyone associated with the former Sunni-led government of Saddam Hussein.”1
This human rights abuse eerily echoes that of Abu Ghraib only a few years before.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/04/2010428143829403118.html
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